I have been emailing back and forth with Dracula's granddaughter over the past few weeks.  After reading her last email, I find myself devastated by her remembrances of the 2 years she lived in my home.  Chiquita was 6 when she moved in with us and 8-years-old when she left.

Chiquita was taken from her mother by Protective Services because of her mother Carla's neglect of her, her two younger siblings and two male cousins that her mother had in her care.  Chiquita's grandfather had reported her mother to Protective Services on at least 2 seperate occasions.

Chiquita's mother moved them out of a home that Dracula owned and moved into a homeless shelter.  Someone had told the fool that she could become eligible for Section 8 subsidized housing if she was homeless, so she moved Chiquita and her siblings into the shelter, a few weeks prior to Chiquita's graduation from Kindergarten.  Chiquita never got to attend her graduation.

The grandfather dropped dime on her mother to PS.  Me and Dracula went to court and rescued Chiquita from a potential foster care placement.  I was unwilling to take the other children, all of whom had fathers that her mother knew how to contact.

After Chiquita moved into my house, I would find the toilet bowel filled with wads toilet paper.  Her mother had never taught her to how to properly wipe herself.  I would find food in her bedroom.  The environment that she had been removed from was so competitive that she would hide food from the other children, so that she might have enough to eat.  It took me six months to convice her that she could go into the refridgerator whenever she wanted to!

I don't have any children.  When Chiquita came to my home I took personal responsibility for her.  Dracula had 2 jobs, so she was out of the house from 7am until 10pm, most days.  I drove Chiquita to and from a private Lutheran school that I paid for; picked her up each day; cooked dinner or her; took her out to eat; washed her hair and tried to be as good a parent as the 2 I had been raised by. 

Chiquita lived with us for 2 years.  At the end of each year we had to go to court to determine if she was to continue living with us.  At the end of the first year, I told the judge about Chiquita's inability to perform rudimentary personal care, at age 6.  The female judge was appalled and ordered that she remain in my home. 

By the end of the second year, i did not get out of bed to go to court.  Chiquita's mother had harrassed me through Dracula for 2 years over the child.  The morning of the second hearing, it occurred to me that I was spending 10 grand a year out of pocket for aggravation that I simply did not need.  Her mother Carla allowed her youngest trick baby and one of the cousins to languish in foster care as she fought with me over custody of Chiquita!

This past week Chiquita called me a bully to Dracula and expressed her disdain for me because I "stole" her from her mother.  At age 18, she believes that we deliberately created the situation that caused her to be taken from her mother and siblings.  She stated that a therapist told her that the reason she could not remember her childhood; prior to moving into my home, was because of the trauma that she experienced from being snatched from the nest by me and her grandmother!!!

Now I Live Up To The Subtitle Of My Blog

Chiquita's mother Carla grew up in an upper middleclass neighborhood on the westside of this city.  Carla attended private schools.  She lived with Dracula, the man Dracula had tricked into believing that he was Carla's biological father and two half siblings.

One day, the father - who had discovered 3 years into the marriage, that Carla was not his - decided to leave Dracula, after 20 years of marriage, with the kids and the mortgage of that expensive house on the west side.

Sometime during that time period, Carla was seduced by her female volley ball coach and began a life of going back and forth from women to men. 

By the time I came along, Chiquita's mom was on welfare with two children from different trick's, was prostituting herself and abusing substances.  She was raising Chiquita, a younger sibling and two son's that belonged to her crack addicted half sister.

Chiquita was 2-years-old when we first met.  My first meeting with Dracula's family occurred at an eastside church, after the viewing of one of her deceased relatives. 

When Carla was approaching me and Dracula, Chiquita ran up to me and grabbed my hand.  She and I walked hand in hand to meet the rest of her family.

When I found out that Chiquita was to go into foster care because of her mother's negligence, I knew immediately what I had to do.  It was a no brainer.  I took Chiquita in. 

I told Dracula that I would leave her if I came home and found 5 children in my house because I wanted her daughter and the men she and her sister had laid down with to take responsibility for their children.   Chiquita had been lied to about her father.  She is Latina and black but was told that her father is a white man. 

The only time me and Dracula had a disagreement was when we argued about her continuing financial support for her grown ass children.  Dracula never made Chiquita's mother pay rent after we discovered that she had broken into and moved herself into Dracula's family home, while pregnant with her third trick baby. 

Dracula allowed Carla to sell her food stamps each month instead of buying groceries for her children and knew that she was leaving the children home alone while engaging in prostitution.  Dracula  provided Carla with unlimited financial support which was in part the reason why she always worked a second job.  

Dracula would have 1 or 2 part-time jobs at all times while her daughters - who were raised middleclass and went to private schools - resorted to prostitution and drug selling.  And they weren't even good hos because they ended up getting pregnant and were always broke.  They have 5 trick babies between them.  

I begged Dracula to stop subsidizing her children's slovenlyness, to no avail.  Carla managed to put a massive guilt trip on her because she was a bastard who had been tortured by Dracula's in the closet husband for almost 30 years.  

One time after a phone call from Carla, Dracula boo hooed uncontrollably.  It was a terrible thing for a husband to witness because there was NOTHING I could do to console her and I knew in my heart that it would not be the last time.

I tolerated the lies, neglect and financial burdens caused by my wife's hopeless devotion to her grown ass children for 8 years.  Even after we seperated, I attempted to assist her and her family.

On September 11, I received a frantic call from Dracula's youngest sister.  BabyGirl asked me to go retrieve her daugher from high school because she feared for her safety.  I left work and went to the school.  It took almost 2 hours to extract her.  When I got her home, BabyGirl told me that I was "the only one in the family" that she could rely on.  She had asked another sibling, who was downtown that day, to pick up her daughter.  The sibling told her that she was "too busy", so BabyGirl called me.

BabyGirl stood on her lawn and told me that reason that Dracula was always broke was because of her continuing support for her youngest child!  The youngest child is a city employee with a very good job!  He was constantly calling on Dracula to subsidize his lifestyle by loaning him money to buy rims for his truck or to provide extra cash for vacations for himself and his wife!  Dracula was constantly taking out loans through her credit union to 'help' him out. 

In early 2000, when Dracula's middle child was murdered by some fool she trusted, we had to go to the county morgue and identify her body.  When her youngest arrived at the morgue, the FIRST thing that came out of his mouth was: "I'm broke", not an expression of grief for the loss of his sibling!  I paid for the burial of his sister because of my love for Dracula.  NO ONE ELSE offered me a dime.  In fact, when Carla came from Atlanta, to attend the burial, she stayed in our house.  When Carla left all my nice Egyptian cotton bath towels left with her!

I don't expect much in this life and time and experience have taught me that a world that could crucify Jesus has no reward for me.  That does not however dissuade me from what I perceive to be the TRUTH.  And I have this vehicle for telling these things I believe to be true.

Chiquita I forgive you.  I know you love your mother and believe all the lies that her and Dracula have told you about me.  I did the best I knew how to do for you at that particular time.

Just never doubt that I love you and only wanted the best for you.  One day you will have your own unappreciative bastards to deal with.  At that point you will know what my parents, your grandmother and I already know.